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NOTES ON THE VITAL STATISTICS OF THE 
PHILIPPINE CENSUS OF 1903. 



BY 

ISAAC W. BREWER, M. D., 
of Ft. Huachua, Ariz. 






Auth r 
(Parson; 



[Reprinted from American Medicine, New Series, Vol. I, 
No. 7, pages 404-407. October, 1906.] 



NOTES ON THE VITAL STATISTICS OF THE 
PHILIPPINE CENSUS OF 1903/ 

BY 

ISAAC W. BREWER, M. D., 

of Ft. Huachua, Ariz. 

The Philippine Archipelago in latitude ex- 
tends from N. 4° 40' to N. 31° lo^ and in longi- 
tude from E. 116° 40' to £.126° 34'. There 
are 3,114 known islands comprising a land area 
of 115,026 square miles. 

The inhabitants are mostly Malays, Chinese, 
and Negretos and a mixture of the races. The 
Negretos, living in the more inaccessible parts 
of the mountains, are said to number 23,000. 

According to the census innumeration there 
were on March 2, 1903, 7,635,426 people on the 
islands, 6,987,688 were classed as civilized or 
partly civilized. There were 8,135 Americans, 
6,136 other whites and 41,035 Chinese. 

The density of the population for the entire 
archipelago was 67 per square mile. The most 
densely populated province, Ilocos Sur, had 398 
persons to each square mile; 65 percent of the 
Christian population (civihzed natives) live on 
the seacoast. 

The average birthrate computed from records 
for the years 1876 and 1885 to 1898 was 47.9 per 
thousand. The average deathrate for the same 
period was 39.7 per thousand, but omitting the 
cholera years 1879, 1889 and 1890 it was 31.7. 

The following tables with slight modification 
are taken from volumes I and III of the census 
of the Philippine Islands, 1903. 

The census was taken under the direction of 
General J. P. Sanger, U. S. A., Major Charles 

' Abstracted for the American Society of Tropical 
Medicine; published under the auspices of the 
Society. 



2 

Lynch, Surgeon, U. S. A., being his medical 
adviser. 

From a study of the following tables which 
accounts for 93.9 percent of the deaths in the 
Philippine Islands and for 65.4 percent of the 
deaths in the United States, it will be seen that 
in general the excess in deathrate in the Phihp- 
pines occurs among the preventable diseases. 
For such diseases as pneumonia, measles, in- 
fluenza, typhoid fever, and diseases of the kidneys, 
the Philippine deathrate is much lower than in 
the United States. This would seem to indicate 
that the deathrate in the Philippines will not be 
excessive when proper sanitary measures have 
been instituted and when the inhabitants reach 
such a stage of civilization that they will observe 
the ordinary rules of personal hygiene. 

The mortaHty among children under five, is 
very high, being 462 for the brown, 356 for the 
yellow and 586 for white people. This mortal- 
ity is largely preventable. Among the native 
people many children die of convulsions ; probably 
most of them are cases of tetanus, the infection 
taking place through the cord. 

Distribution of Deaths in the Philippine Isl- 
ands AND THE United States, by Principal 
Causes, Expressed in Percentage or the 
Total Number of Deaths — 1Q02. 

Cause of death. Philippine United 

Islands. States. 

Cholera 31 . i .... 

Malarial fever 26.8 1.4 

Tuberculosis of the lungs. .. . 6.6 10.7 

Epilepsy 5.1 0.3 

Dysentery 3.7 i.i 

Convulsions ^.6 1.5 

Smallpox 3.4 0.3 

Diarrheal diseases 3.2 ;^.^ 

Beriberi 1.3 .... 

Diseases of the stomach 1.2 1.3 

Bronchitis 0.7 1.9 

Accident 0.7 .... 



3 

Pregnancy 0.7 0.6 

Measles 0.6 1.2 

Tetanus 0.6 0.2 

Influenza 0.4 1.6 

Typhoid fever 0.4 3.4 

Diphtheria 0.3 1.6 

Croup 0.3 1.2 

Asthma 0.3 0.3 

Simple meningitis 0.2 1.2 

Congestion, hemorrhage, and 

softening of the brain 0.2 

Congenital debility and mal- .... 

formations 0.2 .... 

Erysipelas 0.2 • 0.3 

Tumors 0.2 0.3 

Rheumatism 0.2 0.5 

Anemia 0.2 0.2 

Scarlet fever o.i 0.6 

Whoopingcough o.i 0.9 

Dengue 0.1 .... 

Other forms of tubeitulosis. . 0.1 .... 

Cancer 0.1 2.8 

Organic diseases of heart .... 0.1 6.7 

Pneumonia 0.1 10.2 

Nephritis and Bright's disease 0.1 3.5 

Puerperal septicemia 0.1 0.3 

Female diseases of the genital 

organs 0.1 0.3 

Paralysis 0.1 2.3 

Diseases of pharynx 0.1 .... 

Diseases of bones 0.1 0.1 

Hemorrhage 0.1 .... 

Senile debility 0.1 2.8 

Bubonic plague^ .... 

Leprosy ^ . • • • 

Suicide ' 0.5 

^ Represented. 

Table I shows the percentages of deaths from 
the more important diseases by season for the 
year 1902: 

The foregoing statistics confirm the general 
impression gained from three years' service in 
the Philippines, that the greatest deathrate 
occurred in the wet season. Variola is more 



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fatal during the dry season while there is little 
seasonal differences for malaria. 

Table of deaths in 1902 arranged by months 
and seasons, with percentages of total number 
of deaths which occurred in each: are shown in 
Table II . 

Table III shows the normal meteorologic con- 
ditions at Manila (latitude N. 14° 35', longitude 
E. 121°) and the conditions that prevailed in 
1902: 

The following table of comparative death- 
rates of whites in the Philippine Islands and the 
registration area of the United States shows the 
relatively great mortality among children 
under five: 

Age Group. Philippine United 

Islands. States. 

Under i year 448 165 

Under 5 years 138 52 

5 to 14 years 22 4 

15 to 24 years 20 6 

25 to 34 years 21 9 

35 to 44 years 27 12 

45 to 64 years 47 22 

65 and over 391 87 

The deathrates are analyzed by color and 
those of the brown people by sex in Table IV. 

Table V show each of the three most promi- 
nent races — brown, white and yellow — and for 
the eight principal diseases, the proportional 
number of victims of each disease to the total 
number of deaths of the race in 1Q02. 

The following table shows the relation of 
disease to the seacoast: 

Disease Death rate 

Interior Coast 

Malarial fever 23 . 7 13.8 

Cholera 21.4 18.9 

Tuberculosis of the lungs. ... 5.7 3.4 

Diarrheal diseases 5.7 3.6 

Smallpox 2.2 2.1 

Beriberi 0.6 0.9 



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The table should not be interpreted to mean 
that the lowlands are more healthy than the 
higher ground. Very little of the higher ground 
in the Philippines is occupied by civiHzed 
population. 

Cholera appeared in Manila in March, 1902, 
and spread rapidly over the islands, causing 
3 I.I percent of the deaths that year and 19 per- 
cent of the deaths in 1903. The total number 
of deaths from this disease recorded in the 
census reports was 200,348. During the epi- 
demic of 1879 there were about 400,000 deaths 
from cholera and in 1889-1890 the mortality 
from the disease was about 260,000. At the 
date of the present writing (September 6, 1905) 
the daily press reports the reappearance of the 
disease in Manila. 

Table VI shows the statistics relative to the 
defective classes among the civilized popula- 
tion: 

Manila, the chief city of the archipelago, is 
situated on the west coast of the island of Luzon 
in latitude N. 14° 35'. It occupies the delta of 
the Pasig river and the soil is damp and badly 
polluted. ^ 

The population as given by the census was 
219,928. The deathrates since 1900 were as 
follows: 1900, 44.5; 1901, 42.6; 1902, 69.2; 1903, 
44.7. 

The high rate for 1902 was caused by the 
epidemic of cholera that prevailed during that 
year. 

The following shows the deathrate for Manila 
and several other tropical cities: Bombay, 
India, 1901, deathrate 76.7; Manila, P. I., 1903, 
deathrate 44.7; Alexandria, Egypt, 1901, death- 
rate 37.3; Calcutta, India, 1903, deathrate 37.0; 
Cairo, Egypt, 1901, deathrate 34 8; Havana, 
Cuba, 1 90 1, deathrate 22.1. 

In the following table are shown the deathrates 



for the principal diseases for Manila and the rest 
of the archipelago for 1902: 



Disease 



Convulsions 16 

Cholera 15 

Tuberculosis of lungs 4 

Bronchitis 3 

Diarrhea 3 

Dysentery i 

Meningitis i 

Malarial fever i 

Beriberi 2 



Deathrate Deathrate 

for for 

Manila Archipelago 



2-3 
20.0 
4.0 
0.4 
2.0 
2.0 
0.2 
17.0 
1 .0 



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